The Red Car Trolleys are part of the new Buena Vista Street experience at Disney California Adventure. The two battery-powered trolleys - one painted deep red and this one Indian red with a "butterfly" trim - transport park guests to Hollywood Land. They are smaller-scale replicas of the famed Red Cars of the Pacific Electric Railway that covered four counties but went out of service in the early 1960s.

Meet the guy who guided the development of the Red Car Trolleys at Disney California Adventure: Ray Spencer, creative director for Walt Disney Imagineering for Buena Vista Street. Spencer, a train buff, remembers riding the real Red Cars when they were on their last legs in 1961. He was 8 years old when his father took him for a ride on the Long Beach line from downtown Los Angeles.

"Storytellers," a statue of Walt Disney and Mickey Mouse, greets guests in the central plaza on Buena Vista Street at Disney California Adventure. Buena Vista Street is intended as a counterpart to Main Street in Disneyland, evoking the era of the 1920s and '30s when Walt Disney came to California and began his animation studio. Two replica Red Car Trolleys that traverse Buena Vista Street bear numbers symbolic to the Disney legend: 623 and 717. Walt Disney's arrival in Los Angeles in 1923 is reflected in No. 623 and No. 717 refers to the day Disneyland opened, July 17, 1955.

The Red Car Trolleys of Buena Vista Street at Disney California Adventure travel back and forth from the newly revamped entrance to Hollywood Land and the Tower of Terror ride with a few stops in between.

Red Car trolleys depart the Pacific Electric Railway terminus in downtown Los Angeles circa 1910. The trolley system reached its heyday in the 1920s and '30s, and then steadily declined in ridership as cars and buses became the preferred mode of transportation in the greater Los Angeles area.

This map shows the extent of the Pacific Electric Railway that transported people on the famous Red Cars to destinations in four Southern Calfornia counties for decades before ending service in 1961.

A view looking out of one of two Red Car Trolleys on the new Buena Vista Street at Disney California Adventure Park. The trolleys are smaller-scale reproductions of the Red Cars of the bygone Pacific Electric Railway that served much of Southern California. With a few concessions to amusement park efficiency and safety, the Buena Vista Street trolleys are faithful replicas inside and out.

Ray Warren, the show/ride technical director from Walt Disney Imagineering, stands inside a Red Car Trolley. Ray Spencer, the creative director for Walt Disney Imagineering of Buena Vista Street at Disney California Adventure, leans on a caution gate where two replica trolleys are stored while not in service.

Lisa Girolami, left, director and senior show producer, and Ray Spencer, creative director of Buena Vista Street, talk about the changes at Disney California Adventure. Spencer is an avid fan of trains and oversaw the trolley car project.

The Wig-Wag signals behind Ray Spencer at Disney California Adventure are replicas of caution signs that let people know if a Red Car Trolley was about to cross the tracks in front of them. Spencer is the creative director for Walt Disney Imagineering for Buena Vista Street at Disney California Adventure.

Imagine the young animator dashing from a business meeting in downtown Los Angeles to his studio in Hollywood in the early 1920s.

He doesn’t have a car, so he boards the Pacific Electric Railway heading west.

Why, it could be Walt Disney seated in a Red Car trolley, riding along the busy Hollywood Boulevard Line.

That’s the kind of nostalgic image the Red Car Trolleys of Buena Vista Street are intended to create when guests hop aboard the new attraction at Disney California Adventure Park.

Two trolleys – one painted deep red like the earliest Red Cars and the other flame red with the “butterfly” trim from the late ’30s – will operate daily and transport up to 21 passengers each past the attractions of the new Buena Vista Street on their way to Hollywood Land and the last stop at the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror ride.

The Buena Vista Street experience evokes the story of Walt Disney’s arrival in California from Kansas City, Mo., when he stepped off the Santa Fe de Luxe in Los Angeles in 1923.

“One of the ways he most likely got around once he arrived in California was on the Pacific Electric Red Cars,” says Ray Spencer, Disneyland Resort’s creative director for Buena Vista Street Carthay Circle Theatre and the Red Car Trolleys. “In 1923, that was an integral part of how people traveled in Southern California. It seemed like a natural fit.”

The numbers on the replica Red Car Trolleys – 623 and 717 – serve a dual purpose. They harken back to the 600 and 700 series of trolleys built for the Pacific Electric system in the ’20s and also bear significance to the Disney story: 623 for Walt Disney’s 1923 arrival in California and 717 in reference to the day Disneyland opened, July 17, 1955.

Unless you were born in the 1950s or earlier, it’s not likely you ever had the chance to ride the Red Cars when they served the greater Los Angeles area.

Spencer, 58, is one such lucky fellow.

His dad took him for a ride on the last of the Red Car lines in 1961 when he was 8. Father and son rode from the terminus at 6th and Main in downtown Los Angeles out to Long Beach, the most heavily trafficked route on the system.

“I remember it being a rough ride. It was toward the twilight of the Red Cars,” says Spencer, a longtime fan of trains. “The tracks were old, the cars were old. The maintenance was deferred. It sounded like a bucket of bolts rolling down the track.”

Even with the rough ride, Spencer found the trip exciting – much the same way he feels about being able to re-create the Red Car experience on a small scale for the revamped California Adventure.

“I knew about trolleys. I knew about the Red Cars. To have the opportunity to execute a version of them is a dream come true for me,” says Spencer, who grew up without a TV and would read about trains in his leisure time.

Spencer gathered research for the Buena Vista Street trolleys from museums, libraries and railway historical societies to get the details right.

“At the end of the day, people want to remember these as they were.”

The trolleys are faithful versions of the famous Red Cars of Los Angeles, with certain exceptions.

The high-tech Buena Vista Street trolleys are about half the length of the real ones and run on batteries. But for authenticity, the juiceless wires that connect to an overhead cable were designed and installed by companies that do electrical wiring for light rail and transit systems, Spencer says.

The replicas have doors at their middle, just like the “Hollywood Cars” they are modeled after. But passengers sit on benches to either side rather than the front-to-back bus-style seating of the originals. Ads done in a vintage design tout shops and other places along the Buena Vista Street route – Trolley Treats Candy and Clarabelle’s Hand-Scooped Ice Cream among them.

Each car will have two conductors, who will keep up a patter of historical and fun facts about the trolleys, Buena Vista Street and California Adventure Park. And at various times throughout the day, the “Red Car Newsboys” will be onboard to sing “California, Here I Come!” and other numbers.

Michael Patris, who heads up the Pacific Electric Railway Historical Society, says he is disappointed that he wasn’t among those contacted for background on the Red Cars, but he believes the attraction might add to the Red Car legacy.

“In some odd way perhaps people will gain more of an appreciation for what we had in our local history by seeing what’s being emulated today at Disney and outside of Disney,” he says about the trolleys at the park and the growing network of light rail lines serving commuters in Southern California.

Patris says the Red Cars hit a peak ridership of 1,139,480 passengers one day in 1923 – the year Disney transported his considerable talent and dreams to Southern California from the Midwest.

The Pacific Electric Railway, developed by real estate magnate Henry Huntington and advertised as the “World’s Greatest Electric Railway System,” once covered more than 1,000 miles of track and operated more than 2,700 electric cars that took passengers to destinations in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties.

But by the time Disneyland opened in 1955 in Anaheim, one of more than 50 cities formerly served by railway, the trolleys had already taken a back seat to cars and buses.

The Red Cars shut down in 1961. The demise had nothing to do with an alleged conspiracy between the likes of General Motors, Firestone, Standard Oil Company of California, and others who would stand to benefit from a switch to cars and buses from a rail line, says Patris.

Pacific Electric itself ran buses as early as 1909, he points out. Cities were increasingly reluctant to pay for street upgrades and modifications for the rail service, and servicemen returning from World War II with money to spend chose the independence of owning an automobile over mass transit.

People in their 70s and older likely remember the Red Cars best, Patris says. His grandmother, Ruth Shepman, always spoke of them fondly and told him about a trip she took around the age of 16 with her mom, brother and sister from Long Beach to Rubio Canyon and the Mount Lowe incline above Los Angeles.

“It took all day. They shared one sandwich and one Coke when they got to Alpine Tavern, 3 miles past the top of the incline.”

Theresa Walker is a Southern California native who has been a staff writer at The Orange County Register since 1992. She specializes in human interest stories and social issues, such as homelessness. She also covers nonprofits and philanthropy in Orange County. She loves telling stories about ordinary people who do the extraordinary in their communities.

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